


I Believe in a Thing Called Love

by ApolloAttraction



Category: Young Avengers
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-02
Updated: 2016-04-02
Packaged: 2018-05-30 16:06:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6431185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ApolloAttraction/pseuds/ApolloAttraction
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>David’s maddening quest for his soulmate in a world where you see colors whenever your destined one is near you, but you don’t get to keep the colors until you kiss.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Believe in a Thing Called Love

“Are you… _yellow?_ ” David asked incredulously. 

Josh looked up from the book he was reading and quirked an eyebrow. “ _Technically_ , I’m  _gold._ ”

“Oh,” David blinked and the colors were gone. “She didn’t stay around.”

Josh chuckled. “At least you know she exists now.”

David shrugged; he wasn’t too concerned with finding his soulmate yet. Everyone knew it was destiny to find them. Every movie and Young Adult novel hammered the exact way you would walk across a crowded room, eyes searching frantically for _the_ _one._ And then, BAM, colors burst in and a symphony swells.

Right now, though, there were midterms and missions and plenty of things to keep his mind more than occupied until he got his own violin overture.

————

David got older and he started to grit his teeth every time he saw someone with their soul mate. He had realized that those movies he so optimistically pictured whenever _the one™_ came up in conversation were probably a lot better for people who could _actually see the colors_. The blacks, whites, and greys of his world weren’t just annoying, but also taunting; his soul mate had only ever gotten close enough for him to see color _three times_ since that initial moment and they _never_ stayed around.

“Orange looks good on you,” Julie said as she looped his tie into the perfect windsor knot (he could do it himself, but she wouldn’t _let_ him.)

“It really brings out your eyes,” her girlfriend, who also happens to be _the one™_ for her, agreed enthusiastically.

David smoothed the wrinkles out of his shirt. It was just another shade of grey to him. He was about to grumble something out about it when his date knocked on the door.

“Go get ‘em tiger,” Karolina said and gave him a bright, beautiful So-Cal grin. Julie gave him a thumbs up. He still wasn’t sure how this “filling the gap” dating was supposed to work, but they gave him hope that it would be worth his while.

The girl on the other side of the door was gorgeous, even before he was assailed by the electric blue of her hair and the soft pink of her dress. It was gone almost as soon as it happened, but it felt like a blessing. Maybe his soul mate™ was looking out for him after all.

“If you stare at me much longer, we’re going to miss the movie,” Nori said with the cutest smirk.

————-

Nori was perfect. She was witty and elegant and assertive and _perfect_ …except that she wasn’t his _soul mate_. And that really was the downfall of their relationship. Though, most people wanted to say it was because he was _baseline_ status now and she wasn’t. How could he explain the nagging thought of his _destined love_ being right out of reach, though? He fumbled through it with gestures and sighs every time; not a single elegant word was left to describe the person who kept running through his mind. He wanted to _know_ them. And, more than that, he wanted to know why the Hell they kept jumping in and out of his vision parameters. What kind of person would literally _ignore_ their true love?

“Commitment issues?” Nori suggested over the phone one night (because they are always going to be friends.)

David snorted. “That would be my luck.”

“Who said it was her-or him? You’ve got to think; you’re not noticing them, either.” She replied and he could almost hear her grin.

“I can assure you I notice.” his retort landed flat though.

“Uh-huh. So, that’s why you’ve never noticed the same person showing up over and over?”

He had explained it before, so he knew she was teasing him, trying to rile him up. He rolled his eyes and changed the subject. It stuck in his mind, though, and so he bought a notebook and stuck the title **Where in the World is my Soulmate** on the cover.

———

Tuesday morning, November 28th at 12:33pm

The Skrulls had invaded (again) and, more importantly, David’s soulmate was in his vision parameter for _a whole 2 minutes._ He pulled out his notebook at the same time that the paparazzi pulled out their cameras and jotted down the exact date and time. Unfortunately, considering the amount of debris and lasers happening, it wasn’t exactly safe to look around.

——–

Josh dragged David out to brunch with Loa and Julie and Karolina, officially making him the grumpy fifth wheel.

“He’s got a book now,” Josh betrayed him.

“Oooh, really?” Karolina asked, her eyes lighting up like stars. “Can we see it?”

“It only has one entry,” David replied with a huff. “She- or he- or whatever- hasn’t shown up around here since the invasion.”

“The skrull invasion?” Julie raised an eyebrow. “Do you think maybe she’s one of them?” David shrugged.

“You know, I could have Xavin-” Karolina started until she noticed the glares she was getting from both Julie and David.

“I do not want your Prince to scour his kingdom for my soulmate,” David replied matter-of-factly.

“Princess,” Karolina corrected quietly.

“Besides, I don’t think they’re a Skrull. I’ve been 'seeing’ them around since high school.” David sighed.

“What about a teleporter?” Loa suggested gently. “My College roomie had a boyfriend whose soulmate just about went bonkers because they kept teleporting around each other.”

David nodded, the thought had crossed his own mind several times, but it filled him with dread because how on _Earth_ would he ever track down someone who could teleport? It would be like finding a flea in a-

Loa’s dress was green, Julie’s shirt was red, and the steak omelet was definitely undercooked. David jumped out of his seat so fast that he nearly knocked over the coke he was drinking. Vision parameters didn’t necessarily mean he could directly see his soulmate, but it did mean they were close enough to be seen. He ran to the door of the restaurant, but by the time he got to the sidewalk the violent colors of the world had dulled back to white, grey, and black. He let out a frustrated huff and returned to the table.

He whipped out a pocketbook and scribbled down the date before sending his omelet back.

——

David had a total of nine entries before the so-called 'Dead’ year where he didn’t 'see’ his significant other at all. He started to slink around. He left his pocketbook at home more often. He got a 9 to 5 at a call center, expecting that at least if his significant other was _actually_ dead he could have the frustrating experience of helping the absolutely idiotic callers to distract him.

On a particularly slow day in July, he kicked his feet up on his desk and was musing about what it would mean to have 'missed’ his destiny. He was throwing pencils at the wall of his cubicle when his computer monitor’s screensaver turned into a green and white aurora and the pencil blinked into a light red color. He sat up so fast that the computer chair rolled out from under his and he faceplanted into the floor. Brad from the cubicle behind him gave him a look as he scrambled to his feet and dashed to the lobby.

“Did someone just come by?” He demanded of the receptionist. He could see her bright pink lipstick and pressed blue suit perfectly, but he could feel the colors already ebbing away. She shook her head, brown hair bobbing slightly. He turned and ran through the front doors. He hit the sidewalk and caught a flash of white ( _white_ of all the damn colors) before his vision settled back into the familiar hues.

——

He was at starbucks and so tired that he didn’t notice he was seeing colors until the barista handed him back his red debit card. The colors are gone before he can get the card back into his pocket.

He started carrying around **Where in the World is my Soulmate** without any regard to the strange looks he got. If destiny’s plan is later rather than sooner, he was tired of waiting.

He sat in central park with Karolina and her friend Molly on a Saturday, waiting for a nearby parade. There were  _ thousands _ of people, one of which was his soulmate. He cursed and ran through the crowd, grumbling out “move, I’m looking for my soulmate!” and getting more than 1 reply of “Aren’t we all, bud.” He didn’t even see the parade for looking at all the people.

He wondered if he imagined the  _ white _ he saw that one day. Was it white hair or a white hood or a white hat? Had the colors already started to go when he saw it.

He had turned  **Where in the World is my Soulmate** into a decoupage project on the living room wall of his apartment. There were newspaper articles, cellphone pictures, sticky notes, and a map of the east coast with cities circled- all of which surround each 'sighting’ of his significant other. There were 32 sightings by the following May.

David started to return to the places he’d seen his significant other in hopes of finding them. Then, of course, he started to 'see’ them around work  _ all the time _ . Everyday for about 5 minutes in the morning he would catch the color of the receptionist’s blouse and maybe whatever Argyle Abomination Brad was wearing as a tie before the world dipped back into bleak tones. 

He made a list of everyone that could be in the building for only 5 minutes. Surprisingly, it was a lot. He wouldn’t put it past fate to give him a teleporting janitor as a soulmate at that point.

A week went by without any sightings. He got on a train to go visit some friends a few states over. Right around Jersey he got to see the paisley flowers of the seatbacks for a whole ten minutes as he ran down the aisles in each compartment mumbling. “They better be on this train. I don’t care if they can fly or teleport or whatever.” As staff escorted him back to his seat, he let out a small indignant screech as the colors faded away again.

He was at the end of his rope. The map was filled with circles, the newspaper clippings ranging in articles benign and scandalous, the cellphone pictures didn’t repeat a single face even once (he knew, because he’d carefully studied each for hours) Every day at work the colors would flood in so violent and then either quietly disappear or blink away without him seeing anything other than a familiar face.

A dead week turned into another dead year and he gave up.

——–

David was getting along just fine, possibly even  _ better _ since he stopped searching for his soulmate. Karolina and Julie seemed relieved. Josh seemed concerned. “You never leave your house anymore,” he whined once on one of their “Boys’ night out.”

“I’m here with you. Right now. We are literally hundreds of miles from my house.” David replied, only slightly disgruntled.

“Yea, but I literally had to show up at your door and pull you down to my car.” Josh punctuated the sentedwith the most worried expression David had ever seen on him.

“Fine, I’ll go out more,” he relented.

——-

Julie’s work didn’t give her enough time off to ever travel more than an hour or so from Manhattan, so when Karolina _had_ to travel for some big sort of event she was always dateless. David offered to go to the next thing she had to do just to get her to stop whining about it; he didn’t expect her to take him up on it.

But there he was at a fancy party for some company that had recently been featured on the cover of Forbes. “ _Who_ exactly do you know here?” he asked Karolina incredulously.

She smiled, “Well, Molly is friends with the Owner’s daughter’s ex-boyfriend and he said she could bring friends.”

“And where’s Molly?” David pressed as he adjusted his tie for the billionth time. (Burlington Coat Factory just couldn’t match up to all the _Armani_ and _Chanel_ glittering across the room.)

“Oh, she hates these kind of things,” Karolina said with a dismissive hand wave. “Hey, let’s dance. You know how to Waltz, right?”

“I don’t think you’re supposed to dance,” He remarked and glanced over at the string quartet in the corner of the room. They were playing something quick yet somehow still legato; it honestly sounded like something you would hear while trapped in an elevator at Macy’s. “I think it’s just for the ambiance.”

She pouted. “Well, that’s no fun. Open bar, though; do you want anything?”

Her dress was short and glittering with faintly pink sequins. He blinked a few times to make sure the subtle color was actually there. “No, thanks,” he replied. “I’ll just wait for you.” He resolved not to seek out his significant other, even as the colors grew steadily more vibrant. There were so many black dresses, but the truly daring wore red or silver. The heiress sat next to her father in a dark purple gown, though her eyes were locked on a woman wearing a suit across the room.

Desperately needing a distraction from the colors he was seeing, he went toward the suited woman. “Hey,” he started.

“No, not interested,” She headed him off, never taking her eyes off of the Heiress.

“No, I’m not-” David stopped, figuring there was no way that would start a decent conversation. “Do you know her?”

“My girlfriend,” The woman said with a smirk.

“Oh,” David nodded. “Why aren’t you sitting with her?”

The woman snorted. “She doesn’t want her daddy to know because he’ll hand the company over to her and she doesn’t want it.”

“She doesn’t want a fortune 500 company?” David balked with a little laugh.

The woman nodded, “Si, and neither did her sisters.”

“Your girlfriend is crazy, no offense,” David nodded with a smile.

“Crazier than you think.” The woman agreed with a grin. “America, by the way.”

“David,” he replied in kind. He started to ask her something else but stopped as her gaze turned to the door and she rolled her eyes. The world had settled into a rainbow of hues and the quartet played something that he could vaguely recall was written by Vivaldi. He followed her gaze to the doorway and saw the three late arrivals she was watching. There was a tall, broad blonde with adorable dimples and perfect lips. A brunet with a pretty smile and hair that looked like he had spent hours carefully combing it into place. And lastly, _the one, the only, David’s Soulmate™_

David rubbed his eyes, then glanced back to the trio. The last man, with pure white hair and vibrant green eyes and gestures too quick to tell _exactly_ what they were supposed to be made all the colors in the room vibrate for David. They were so glaringly, assaultingly bright whenever he looked at the other man that he almost wanted to turn and walk the other way just to tone them down.

Maybe that was why the other man kept avoiding him?

With that thought, David’s feet set in motion and he walked straight toward the other man. He had so many words on the tip of his tongue, so many thoughts and pleas and praises that he wasn’t sure what he’d say first. When he was finally standing just a foot from his significant other he blurted out, “What the _Hell_ is _wrong_ with you?”

“Tommy, what did you do _now?”_ the Brunet asked, earning a glare from David’s significant other.

“I didn’t _do_ anything,” Tommy protested.

David’s face fell and he took a step back, “What do you _mean_ you didn’t _do_ anything? I have been looking for you for _years_!”

“Why?” Tommy looked incredulous.

“Why? You’re asking me _why?_ ” David was near screeching. He reached out and planted a hand on either side of Tommy’s face and pulled him into a sloppy kiss because he’d be _damned_ if he let the colors slip away from him again, even if this _idiot_ wanted to stand around and deny everything. “Soulmates are not supposed to be this frustrating. _”_ David mumbled as he pulled away, leaving Tommy in awe.

The Heiress flowed over to them, looking just barely more than bored. “What’s going on?”

“Tommy’s found _the one_ ,” The brunet told her with a grin.

She snorted, “Just an average night then.”

“No,” The blonde said, pulling a very serious face, “Like, I think he _actually_ found the one. Or, well, _the one_ found him, I guess.”

“Oh,” The Heiress grinned, “Should we move this to the complementary suite upstairs, then. You’re kind of causing a scene.”

David followed them silently, with an angry crease between his brows. Along the way he picked up their names, Kate, Tommy, Teddy, Billy. He didn’t feel like talking to any of them, though; he wanted answers as to where his soulmate had been for _so long._ Tommy wasn’t saying, much either, so he didn’t expect the other man to be the first to speak once Kate, Billy, and Teddy had left them alone in the Suite.

Still, that’s what happened. Tommy stood in the center of the room, glancing at the door like he would bolt out of it any second as he asked, “What do you _mean_ I’m your soulmate?”

“What do _you_ mean? _I_ mean you’re my _soulmate_ , my one and only, my better half, my _one_ and all that; it’s pretty obvious.” He feels like he’s talking to some _ninja_ on the help line at work.

Tommy is quiet and takes a break from staring at the door to look at David with suspicion. “But _we’re not._ Soulmates are supposed to see in color when they meet.”

David presses a hand to his head, fighting off a headache. “Yea and obviously we _are_ because-” he stops and looks at Tommy, confusion evident on his face. “You can’t see the colors?”

Tommy shakes his head. David flops down onto the bed in the middle of the suite and starts to laugh. “That’s awesome. I’ve been running in circles trying to find you and you didn’t even notice me.”

Tommy smirked, “Running is kind of  _my_ thing, so what exactly do you mean by that?” 

David shrugged and started to explain how he had tracked every moment and plastered his wall with anything that might have ever been relevant to his search. As he spoke, he realized how insane it all sounded, but Tommy just sat down beside him and started nodding. “Wait,  _where_ do you work?” Tommy asked once the subject of the agonizing 5 minute visits came up.

Tommy started to laugh. “I quit that job like a  _year_ ago when my team got back together. I was the speed guy for the factory work in the basement.”

“Oh my God, how did I not put that together,” David said and rubbed his hands over his face.

Silence stretched between them for a few minutes. Tommy hesitantly breached it, “So, this is real. We’re soulmates?”

David nodded.

“Are you sure?” Tommy pressed and it sounded like a joke, but David could see how gaurded the other man’s body language had become and could see the hesitance in his eyes.

David nodded again, this time with a sympathetic frown. “Do you really not see the colors?”

Tommy shrugged, “It’s all pretty monotone. Maybe a few more shades of grey than I usually see but…maybe I’m just being, you know,  _hopeful.”_

David watched him for a moment then reached out and cupped his cheek. “Tommy-” he paused, “What’s your last name?”

“Shepherd,” The man supplied with a small smile.

“Alright,” David said and started again, “Tommy Shepherd, you and I are _soulmates._ You are my one and my only. And I _swear_ if you look at that door one more time I will nail it shut.”

“Hey, I get you’re trying to have a moment, but it’s a little overwhelming,” Tommy said defensively.

David rolled his eyes and dropped his hand from the other’s face. Well, if overwhelming’s the best we’ve got; I guess it works.”

Tommy laughed and relaxed his tensed posture. “I didn’t even think I had a soulmate; it’s a big change.”

David knew that feeling. Every day he didn’t see colors had driven him nearly insane; he could hardly imagine _never_ seeing them. “Hey,” he started, drawing Tommy’s contemplative look away from the ceiling. “Can I kiss you?”

“I’m pretty sure you already did,” Tommy’s lips quirked into a smirk and he turned ever so slightly toward David.

David rolled his eyes, “Sorry about that?”

“It’s fine,” Tommy assured him. “Just prove to me you can kiss better than _that_.”

David took that as an invitation and leaned in, pressing their lips together. Tommy’s eyes fluttered closed just like a movie actor and his hand came up to David’s neck, pulling the other closer. David’s hand landed on the other side of Tommy’s waist in a desperate attempt to get closer. It was awkward and the kiss was a mess (still better than the first one, though) and David was sort of half-laying on Tommy and half-falling into the floor, and it was _perfect._

David couldn’t think of a single other word to describe it. It was like putting the last piece of the puzzle in place. Every day, every year, every second spent _waiting_ and _searching_ had all led up to this and it was _worth it._ If the world ended at that moment David could have honestly said he would have been okay with his greatest accomplishment being to breathe Tommy in before the sun exploded or the skrulls invaded or however this planet was doomed to go.

He tangled his free hand into the other man’s hair and pulled him closer, deepening the kiss and wishing that it would never end. If only they didn’t have to _breathe._

Tommy pulled away first, his expression absolute awe and wonder. He met David’s eyes and swallowed, “I think I-” He stopped and shook his head, “I believe you.”

David laughed and flopped back against the bed “ _Finally_ ,” and Tommy laid beside him with the softest smile as silence fell over them if it weren’t for the ridiculous overture wheedling its way through the floorboards, they might have even forgot about the party. When they did decide to go back downstairs, they went down together, hand and hand, with Billy, Teddy, America, and Kate trailing behind them like they hadn’t just eavesdropped on the entire exchange through the door. And David got to learn exactly what kind of sense of humor the universe had as Tommy started the exact kind of party-crashing shenanigans that Kate had invited him for.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this forever ago and had it posted on my tumblr, but it never made it over here? (IDK why, I usually put all my longer works here immediately) 
> 
> Anyway, I decided to post it after i realized that, which is why the style it's written in isn't completely consistent with the style i'm currently writing in.


End file.
